The Guidebook on being the Wife of the Queen's Watchdog
by Ten-Faced
Summary: "It's a thankless job, but someone must bear the burden of its duty." Rachel reads the journals of her deceased mother-in-law after becoming the Wife of the Queen's Watchdog, hoping to learn just how to be the most effective partner she can be.


After the wedding and honeymoon, Rachel wasn't quite sure what to do.

When she made the choice to marry Vincent, she'd been all-too aware of his job. Vincent hadn't hidden his dealings with the dark side of humanity to her, out of respect for her choices in life. She had chosen to accept him for the man he was, and to join him in his quest to serve the empire by fighting evils in ways the laws couldn't manage to.

But she didn't have the first clue as to where to start. She had no trainings in breaking codes or fighting, she didn't know much about the Underworld and the black markets with all the illegal goods. She didn't have contacts to bring her information relevant to her husband's cases.

In short, she had no idea what to do – and therefore useless.

When she admitted this to Vincent, he only smiled. "_You_ are all I need," he said to her, holding her gently, warmly.

As much as she loved Vincent, Rachel rather doubted that her being alone – with her asthma and her ignorance on the goings of the Underworld – was what he needed.

He saw her continuing to worry, and so one day, he came back carrying an armful of books. No, not books. Journals, records, diaries, corners softened and covers worn from hands having gone over them a countless number of times.

He gave them all to her, laying out each worn volume out on the table carefully. "These belonged to my mother," he told her as she reached for a notebook with a pink rose embroidered on the cover. She opened it to find a small girl's careful, large handwriting detailing what the insides of the Phantomhive manor was like.

Vincent's mother, the previous Countess Phantomhive, was deceased. She had died when Vincent was still in school, and a few days later her husband, Vincent's predecessor, had passed as well. In the few times he spoke of them, he referred to them fondly and lovingly, remembering his father as a solemn but kind man and his mother as a gentle and unique soul. In the portraits she had seen Vincent had been the image of his mother.

"She would have wanted you to read them," he told her now. "Take good care of them."

Rachel, understanding that these were priceless heirlooms to him, swore she would.

* * *

Vincent's mother, Claudia Phantomhive, had lived a very strange life. Rachel thought as she read through the journals that her life was one that would have made a wonderful, fantastic tale. A grand novel where everyone would get engrossed in the plot and all of its twists, but never once believe that any of it could have been real. Sometimes Rachel even doubted the truth behind the words; that was how fantastic it all sounded.

But she doubted that Vincent's mother would have bothered writing censored content or outright lies in her diaries, the one place where she could truly record all of her thoughts, pouring out the words in her heart she couldn't tell anyone else. Rachel took all of the records in with a grain of salt.

Vincent pointed out a letter stuck in the last pages of the last journal. "She told me that I was to tell my wife to read this part first," he said.

The letter, written in a graceful, lilting hand, was addressed to her. Not her as in Rachel Phantomhive née Dalles, but as in the future Countess of Phantomhive, the one after Claudia herself.

_To the next Lady Phantomhive,_

_I am Claudia Phantomhive, Wife of George Phantomhive, the Queen's Watchdog. If you are reading this, I am dead and gone from this world. Unfortunate – I would have loved to have had the chance to talk to you, to advise you in the ways your life will change by facing the shadows that lurk in the darkness of our world._

_But sometimes, circumstances are out of the control of our hands. Sometimes we are puppets in the hands of something greater than ourselves, and we must endure. So this poor substitute will have to do now._

_I wish I could tell you that marriage to your husband, most likely my son Vincent Phantomhive, will be wonderful and your life will be long, peaceful and prosperous. I wish I could tell you that you will be guaranteed happiness._

_But that would be a lie, and I abhor lies. _

_Truth is, even if this family was not what it was – a safeguard against darkness for the Queen – there would have been no guarantee that your marriage would have led to a happily ever after of fairy tales. With the Phantomhives being what they are, the hand that deals with all of the dirty deeds in the dark, there is even less of a chance of a happily ever after. Your life will be dangerous, tense, and stressful. You will fear for your husband's life every time he is late getting home, and you will worry constantly for the future of your children, heart trembling in terror as you imagine them facing the monsters that you know are out there, and you being unable to protect them._

_But that is what life is – a struggle for survival, to defeat all foes and come out on top, bloody and alive. As a civilized society we have dulled the razor edge of raw instinct, but as a Watchdog – for you, too, have become a hound for our glorious mistress who seeks to protect her – we cannot let our instincts dull. We must fight to protect our own._

_I have kept a journal ever since I have become Claudia Phantomhive. Before that there was no 'I'. I was never anything more than a Phantomhive, ever since that fateful day. You, whose circumstances will most likely not be anything like mine, will read through my journals. Perhaps you will doubt the truth behind my words. _

_I swear to you that everything I have written is the truth – or, at least, what I have believed and perceived to be true. I abhor lies, as I have mentioned above, but more than that, I would not lie to a woman in the same spot as I am in. Being the Wife of the Watchdog is a taxing task that requires great patience and dedication. There will be much trouble along the path of your life – there were certainly many in them._

_Make no mistakes; I was not perfect. I made mistakes, errors in actions that I later came to regret. I cannot foresee the future, but I am of the belief that history and human greed repeats itself. In my journals are the records for troubles that have come my way, and how I dealt with them, both successes and failures, with sections relevant to each problem in the journals marked and annotated in retrospect so as to make them easier to connect. Perhaps you'll be able to avoid making the mistakes I did. Perhaps you'll find a much better way to deal with dilemmas. I hope you do. _

_To close off this letter, I must thank you. It is hard to put the emotions I feel into a single piece of paper, but I must try. This job is a duty, and duty is rarely grateful. This job, perhaps even more so, as it is one of the most thankless jobs in the world. Please know that I am grateful with all of my heart and soul, that words cannot properly deliver the weight of the gratitude in my heart when I write this. It is a thankless job, but without it the Watchdogs would crumble and fail. _

_Thank you, for marrying into the family that holds the weight of the skies. Thank you for everything that you may lose and sacrifice in the future. Thank you, be strong, and may the Lord give you the courage to continue walking into the darkness._

_Claudia, wife, mother, Lady Phantomhive, Wife of the Watchdog._

* * *

AN: So this is like my other headcanon for Claudia. There's going to be a little Claudia/Undertaker in here (because it's me :P), but mostly it'll focus on developing her character, as well as her family I guess?


End file.
